Services

At Making A Scene, we make interior design about you, reflecting your personality while complimenting and enhancing your lifestyle – creating multifunctional spaces that evolve and sustain… like you do. Whether you are looking for validation or guidance with your decorating decisions, help finding that perfect piece to bring it all together, or concept-to-installation decorating help, Making A Scene is here to help you. We work with a team of skilled master trades and installation professionals, we make your scene.

We have you covered; from floor to ceiling.

We tackle projects from the ground up – starting with detailed drawings, samples and plans to installations and everything in between. Making a Scene has partnerships with the leading installation, trade professionals, furniture, draperies and lighting firms.

We offer a complete service including:

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The Consultation

Whether you are looking for validation or guidance with your decorating decisions, help finding that perfect piece to bring it all together, or concept-to-installation decorating help, Making A Scene is here to help. We work with you to select a colour palette, develop a design style, select furniture and accessories, create furniture layouts, and more. No matter what your design dilemma, big or small, we will assist in getting your project done on time and within your budget.

Setting the Tone Paint/Colour Schemes

How would you feel if the ‘perfect paint colour’ was chosen for you in just a matter of hours? Our perfect paint colour consultation begins with an assessment of your personal style, values, and interests, as well as the desired mood or feel of the space, and the existing elements that need to be coordinated with. After all it’s all about you! At the end of the consultation you will receive a personalized colour selection form that details the chosen paint colors for each space, as well as a follow-up to make sure all your questions are answered.

The colour scheme is one of the most important elements of a space, setting the mood and ambiance… bright, cheery yellows can lift our spirits on a rainy day, while calming neutrals can provide a sanctuary for rest and respite. Which is why selecting the right paint colours are essential, but daunting.

Interior Re-Design

Feeling uninspired in your own home? Do you like what you have but feel like a room is ‘off’ or just not working for you? We can re-design your interior space with a one day makeover… the perfect solution to get a brand new space without the cost by using and re-purposing what you already own.

The interior redesign process begins with a consultation to determine your personal style, how you use your space, how you want it to function, and your current likes and dislikes about the space.

We will “shop” your home for any items that you will allow to be moved to further enhance the transformation. Then we will get to work rearranging the furniture and accessories to create the space you deserve and can feel proud of!

Home Staging

Whether a vacant house, an occupied home, or a builder’s model show home, they each have unique requirements that require quick and cost effective solutions. Nobody wants to invest in staging unless there are clear and concrete benefits that translate into a quick and profitable sale. So it all comes down to costs.

There are tricks to making a budget stretch and where to get the biggest bang for the buck. Our job is to analysis this, and help you understand how far your money will go.

We add value by helping buyers emotionally connect with, and visualize a home as the fulfillment of their dream for a new lifestyle. One of the oldest truisms is that people buy a home based on emotion and justify their decision with facts. Buyers relate first to how a home feels before they look to its specifications. In other words, the specs of a home – square footage, R-Values, etc. – don’t come into play in the buying decision until an emotional connection has been made between the buyers and their new home.

We showcase the strengths of the home plans. Smart decorating can accentuate your home’s strengths and moderate its shortcomings. We use design elements – furniture, accessories, artworks, built-ins, window treatments, specialty flooring designs, etc. – to direct buyers’ attention the strengths. Furniture and accessory scale and placement are defined to emphasis and showcase the functionality of living spaces.

According to the National Association of Realtors, staged homes sell for about six percent more, on average, than those not staged. When a home stays on the market, the price goes down, falling an average of 1% for every month it’s on the market. Staged homes sell faster, which means they’re less likely to be subjected to a reduction in price. When it comes to more expensive properties, the difference can be dramatic.

Do the math – how much does the house cost per day to carry during the sale and

closing period? For every dollar spent on staging, the return on investment (ROI) would be $3 in the sale.

Occupied Home Staging

You don’t get a second chance to make a good first impression. Home Staging is the art of depersonalizing a home, highlighting its best features to make it appealing to the widest range of buyers, while increasing the chances for a fast and profitable sale. Unfortunately it’s hard for most homeowners to complete this process because they are emotionally attached to their home and the belongings within it.

The process begins with an in-depth consultation at the home and ends with a prioritized, detailed list of action items to get the house ready for sale. We will start by walking through and making a room-by-room checklist of items that need to be repaired, removed, or rearranged. We discuss optimal furniture layouts to showcase your home to sellers and, if needed, paint colour selections, furniture rental options, accessories shopping and more. At the end of the consultation we will review your to-do list together, determine what else we can help you with (or even if you want to hand over the whole thing to us!) and get you on your way to a fast and profitable sale.

Vacant Home Staging

Staging a vacant space is like staging a movie set, but instead, setting “the lifestyle stage”. Whatever the home and whatever the lifestyle, staging takes an empty shell and transforms it into a home that buyers will fall in love with. Deficiencies are accentuated in a vacant house. Most buyers (an astounding 90%) cannot visualize how to use interior space, and often an unoccupied house appears either vast or too small, cold and “incomplete”. People want to see where they can sit as a family and watch television…. the bachelor needs to see that there is room for entertaining a group of his friends or to impress his girlfriend. It’s about demonstrating a lifestyle, as buyers not only want to purchase a home, they want the lifestyle that comes with it. Buyers do not emotionally connect to an empty space, feeling lukewarm about the property, hence being reluctant to make an offer. When they do make an offer, they expect a discount from the asking price.

One of our tricks is through the uses of vignettes (pronounced vin-yet’), which are carefully planned and arranged illustration of interior décor that tell a story. Better described as furnishing sparingly. Sparse furnishings and smart use of color with paint, wallpaper or other décor can work wonders, making a cramped room seem “cozy,” for example.
We use vignettes when you don’t have a sizeable budget, when the real estate market is hot, when you want to showcase a certain feature of the home or when you want to mask a certain deficiency (we’ve used sound systems to overcome road noise, window coverings to overcome a small back yard, a neighbours brick wall, or a busy street, etc.). We are masters of making your scene.

Merchandising Builder Show Homes

Whether you are renovator of houses with “potential” or a builder of dream homes, at the end of the day, you’re in business to make a profit, sustain and prosper.

Making A Scene makes model home merchandising a unique experience. We act as your marketing partners. When we do a good job, your profits follow quickly. Let’s face it, furnished and decorated model homes outsell unfurnished models more than 2.5 : 1. And model homes that show customers how that home “lives” command higher prices than models that fail to adequately showcase their design and lifestyle attributes.

Merchandising a model show home is much more than interior design. Interior Merchandising focuses on the homes design and the target market when planning furniture placement, accessories and traffic patterns. Combining creative design with consumer knowledge to produce “design themes” and “memory points” that emotionally connect with buyer profiles. In a well-merchandised model home, small rooms look bigger, big rooms look warmer and more inviting and highlighted features will stand out and “sell” themselves. This is particularly true if you merchandise special sexy features such as spas, wine cellars, writing lofts, art studios and other amenities that are aimed at the “hot buttons” of today’s homebuyer.

By focusing on the project design themes and the target buyer profile, many builders report increased values and sales rates for their sites. In addition, several offers are made early in the process to purchase the merchandised model home, and on occasion when the offer is too good to turn down, we’ve moved, re-fitted some or all of the merchandise into another model home for the remainder of the sales process. In some instances, the décor was included in the sale and at a profit for the builder. Make no mistake about it, these subsequent models are always different homes and elevations than the first, creating many unforeseen challenges. We view such requests as accolades – the ultimate measurement of success – being asked back again and again.

Call us to find out how we can help you.

Selecting Builder Model Home Finishes

Commercial Bars and Restaurants

Planning Your New Space

Need help figuring out where all your old things should go in your new space? We can help arrange, organize, and shop to get your house feeling like a home in no time. After you have unpacked our stylists will assess what you already have, determine where furniture and accessories should be placed, and then, if necessary, help you complete each room by providing you with suggestions for future purchases.

Seasonal Spruce Up

Style your home to reflect the current season or holiday so you and your guests can truly get into the spirit of the times/season.

Party/Event Styling

Looking to be the “Hostess with the Mostess”? You can throw the party of the year and wow your guests as soon as they walk through the door. From shopping for the perfect pieces, we can help with all your party and event styling needs.

We are measured by the company we keep – Making A Scene works with some of the leading furniture, flooring, wall/window coverings, lighting and craftsmen in the industry. In fact, all of our business has come from referrals from satisfied customers.